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The Plebs were the general body of Roman citizens (as distinguished from
slaves) in Ancient
Rome. They were distinct from the higher order of the patrician. A member of the
plebs was known as a plebeian ( ). This
term is used today to refer to one who is or appears to be of the
middle or lower order; however, in Rome plebeians could become
quite wealthy and influential.

The origin of the separation into orders is unclear, and it is
disputed whether the Romans were divided under the early kings into
patricians and plebeians, or whether the clientes (or
dependents) of the patricians formed a third group. The nineteenth
century historian Barthold Georg
Niebuhr held that plebeians began to appear at Rome during the
reign of Ancus Marcius, possibly
foreigners settling in Rome as naturalized citizens. In any case,
at the outset of the Roman Republic,
plebeians were excluded from magistracies and religious colleges.
Later on, after a general strike by the plebeians, the law of the
Twelve Tables was promulgated, and
Tabula XI
explicitly forbade intermarriage (which was eventually reversed by
the Lex Canuleia). However, before the
Twelve Tables plebeians were forbidden to know any laws, but were
still punished for breaking them. Despite these inequalities,
plebeians still belonged to gentes,
served in the army, and could become military tribunes.

Even so, the "Conflict of the
Orders" over the political status of the plebeians went on for
the first two centuries of the Republic, ending with the formal
equality of plebeians and patricians in 287 BC. The plebeians achieved this by
developing their own organizations (the concilium plebis), leaders (the
tribunes and plebeian aediles). When the plebeians felt the situation had
become dire, they would instigate a secessio plebis, a sort of general strike
where plebeians would literally leave Rome, leaving the patricians
to themselves.

Modern usage

In British, French, Irish, Australian, New Zealand and South
African English pleb is a back-formation; a derogatory term for someone
thought of as inferior, common or ignorant. See also: prole.